“OsCene 2010 – Contemporary Art and Culture in OC,” hosted by Laguna Art Museum, is a fascinating exhibition of the latest art created by Orange County and Long Beach artists. “OsCene” has become one of the most anticipated and closely watched events art lovers look forward to; something like an art barometer, every two years.

Started in 2004 when Tyler Stallings was curator, it is now shepherded by Grace Kook-Andersen, curator of exhibitions. She gleaned through more than 200 submissions to come up with 50 artists, two of which are collaborative partners. “OsCene” is composed of paintings, drawings, sculpture, photography, multi-media, installation, video, architecture, performance, and design.

Kook-Andersen decided, because it is her first year in Southern California and she is learning about our artists and our region, “to cast the net wide for this show.” In reviewing the art, she was drawn to several themes that encompass the social landscape. These are: popular culture, domesticity, hybridization of cultures, identities, and biology.

Jennifer Celio created a series of graphite pencil drawings on paper. Called the Newville series, it represents an imaginative past (1860) and future (2009) of a place that holds fond memories, her grandparents’ home in Downey. Celio displays “the sad beauty in the evolution of the suburbs from orange tree groves to post-war housing tracts… and [then replaced] with oversized “McMansions.” Celio focuses on the beauty of the subtle changes occurring in suburban society, and her quiet artistic style highlights how this often mundane lifestyle causes us to overlook the dramatic changes that develop over generations. The painstaking detail applied to each drawing seems to reveal the artist’s emotional efforts to glimpse into these changes.”

Jenny Yurshansky creates “Projection,” a set of take-away prints featuring Dr. Martin Luther King’s iconic “I Have a Dream” speech, where only the title and punctuation marks are visible. Viewers trace King’s memorable cadence, much like a song, and fill in the blanks where “his emphatic exclamations and pregnant comma-ed pauses become the notes.” Yurshansky invites us to re-write and remember the dream.

Gina Genis‘ recent “Window Peeping” is a series of large-size chromogenic photographic prints. Brandelyn Dillaway, of Mt. San Jacinto College, wrote a beautiful text that explains the series, entitled “Window Peeping: An Existential Examination of Aging.” The following text is from that essay. Genis “captures the nocturnal activities of a cross-section of average American senior citizens. The works are noteworthy for their technical sophistication and their examination of a relatively rare subject matter in art. They also contain layers of meaning and implications that speak to the complex nature of human existence – its cultural, social, familial, and biological facets. It was on evening walks around a retirement community, that Genis began to photograph interior scenes revealed through open windows. Her camera caught brief glimpses into the lives of the elderly. These were not artificially constructed images, but were spontaneously and discreetly shot to capture a straightforward and honest view of what it means to grow old.”

Genis’ work says much about the ambivalent place that the elderly seem to hold in today’s mainstream culture, a culture that is primarily focused on and celebrates youth. The traditional position of the elderly as wise and relevant heads of family is something that is growing increasingly rare; reverence and respect is being replaced by obsolescence. This is especially pertinent today as baby boomers become senior citizens in growing numbers. “Window Peeping” acutely captures this social, cultural, and demographic shift while asking the viewer to reconcile wider cultural attitudes with their personal views regarding the inevitability of aging.

These are only three examples of the stimulating art that comprises the exhibition. Just think, there is the work of 47 more artists. OsCene 2010 will continue until May 16.

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